


Desolate

by evilwriter37



Series: Comfortember 2020 [1]
Category: DreamWorks Dragons (Cartoon), How to Train Your Dragon (Movies)
Genre: Cuddling, M/M, Nightmares
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-10
Updated: 2020-11-10
Packaged: 2021-03-09 01:48:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27486799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evilwriter37/pseuds/evilwriter37
Summary: Hiccup hears Viggo having a nightmare while trying to escape, and his compassion won't let him leave him alone like that.
Relationships: Viggo Grimborn/Hiccup Horrendous Haddock III
Series: Comfortember 2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2008639
Comments: 24
Kudos: 66





	Desolate

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: nightmares

Hiccup carefully skirted around the tent made of dragon hides. He couldn’t see very well in the dark, but he’d curiously felt it with his hand, and knew it to be made of dragon skin, and that upset him deeply. He was in a Dragon Hunter encampment. He’d been captured along with Toothless, and now, he was trying his best to get free. He had to hurry, or someone would find his guard knocked unconscious and his key missing, along with Hiccup.

That’s when Hiccup heard a noise that wasn’t like the rest of the noises in the camp. It was soft, so soft that at first he wondered if he had just been imagining things. Then it came again, louder this time. It sounded a little bit like a cry, and like it was coming from inside the tent. Hiccup waited with bated breath. What was happening?

A sound like a moan, a sob, then another cry. It… sounded awful, but also oddly familiar. Who was making those noises? And why? It made Hiccup’s heart break a little, though he was in the midst of a Dragon Hunter camp. He figured he  _ had  _ to go check it out, even if it cost him his freedom. He couldn’t leave someone who was in distress, even if they were a Dragon Hunter. 

Figuring that there would be guards at the front of the tent, Hiccup lifted the heavy hides from the side and slipped inside. There was a candle burning on a table, and he was able to see a figure wrapped in a mound of furs nearby. The awful moaning sound came again, and Hiccup realized something… This was Viggo’s tent…

“Viggo,” Hiccup whispered. He didn’t know what to do. The Dragon Hunter chief was clearly having nightmares, but Hiccup couldn’t just leave him to it. That would be stooping to his level of cruelty, and Hiccup never wanted to be like that. 

_ I should just leave _ , Hiccup told himself. But no, he couldn’t. He felt… something for Viggo, something tangible, something real. He didn’t want to admit it though. Was it respect? Maybe partially. There was something else there too though, something else he didn’t want to think about, because if he thought about it, it would become all too real. 

Hiccup took a tentative step forward, then another one. “Viggo,” he said, a little louder this time. He didn’t want the guards outside to know that he was in their chief’s tent. They would certainly think he meant to kill him, and treat him harshly for it. 

He went over to the man, touched his shoulder, and Viggo sprang from sleep so suddenly that it was like he hadn’t even been doing it. Hiccup flinched back as those brown eyes stared at him in bewilderment. There were tears on Viggo’s face. Hiccup had never seen that before, and he realized how vulnerable of a moment he had caught him in. 

“Hiccup?” His voice was a little hoarse, and he cleared his throat. “What on Thor’s green earth are you doing here?”

Hiccup realized this had been a terrible idea. Viggo was just going to throw him back into his cell. He should run now while he still had the chance.

But something in him made him stay. It was compassion. Maybe if he was compassionate towards this man, he would change. 

“I, uh…” Hiccup rubbed at the back of his neck. 

“You escaped your cell,” Viggo said. He sat up, wiped at his eyes. 

“I did.” There was obviously no point in denying it. 

Viggo gave him a long look. Hiccup couldn’t interpret it. 

“I… uh… heard you having a nightmare,” Hiccup said. He sat down cross-legged on the ground. “What was it about?”

Viggo took in a long, shuddering breath. Hiccup didn’t think he was going to tell him, but then he touched the scars on his neck, opened his mouth. “This.”

“Will you be okay?”

Viggo chuckled, wiped at his eyes again. “Of course I’ll be okay, my dear.”

Silence. Neither of them seemed to know what to do.

“How’d you get them?” Hiccup asked. He realized that that was too forward, that Viggo didn’t have to give him an answer. All of this was so strange. Why was Viggo not getting up and instantly throwing him back in his cell or severely punishing him? Why was he talking with him?

Maybe it’s because it was that time of the night that felt surreal, where one would go to sleep later, wake up, and feel like none of it had really happened. 

“A Monstrous Nightmare,” Viggo finally said after a long silence. “I was twelve.”

Another long silence. They weren’t looking at each other. The candle flickered. 

“It almost killed me,” Viggo said. “And I can’t help it, but I still dream of it. I dream of it ending differently. I dream of me not being found. I dream of dying in those woods with no one around me. Alone.”

Gods, that sounded so… desolate and heartbreaking. Hiccup scooted closer, put a hand on Viggo’s shoulder, and Viggo looked at him. His eyes had a soul for once. And that soul was hurting. 

“It’s okay,” Hiccup said. “I get nightmares too.”

“About?”

Hiccup let his hand slip from Viggo’s shoulder. He couldn’t believe he’d touched him like that. He gestured down to his prosthetic. 

“I dream about losing more of me,” Hiccup said. “About losing my other leg, or an arm.” He shuddered a little. “Or that I was awake for the amputation. It’s horrifying.”

Viggo just nodded. Then a small smile crossed his features. “Why are you out of your cell?”

“You know why.”

“So you decided to come to me instead of go to your dragon and escape?”

“I couldn’t leave someone who sounded like they were in pain.”

The smile deepened a little, but it looked slightly sardonic. “Your heart is going to get you killed, Hiccup.”

“I don’t think it is.”

Silence ensued.

“Have you slept at all?” Viggo asked.

“Not a bit.”

Viggo was moving over in the mound of furs. He patted the spot next to him. “Come here.”

“You… want me in your bed?”

Viggo chuckled. “Hiccup, my dear, I’ve wanted you in my bed since I first saw you.”

Panic began to choke up Hiccup’s throat. He shouldn’t have done this. He should have just left. He should have-

“But I do not intend on taking you against your will,” Viggo told him, and that calmed Hiccup down. For some reason, he felt like Viggo was telling the truth, felt like he could trust him.

Hiccup came over and settled himself in the bed with less reservations than he really should have had. Gods, what the fuck was he doing? But oh, it was much more comfortable than sleeping on the hard floor of his cell, and Viggo was pleasantly warm beside him. 

That was when Viggo wrapped an arm around him, and Hiccup suddenly realized how lonely this man must feel. No one around him, not even his own brother, could meet him intellectually. Hiccup was the only one that could. Maybe that was why he had captured him and failed to hurt him. He respected Hiccup, saw him as an equal. 

Viggo sighed happily, and Hiccup found that he actually didn’t mind. 

“Just get some rest,” Viggo told Hiccup. His voice was almost a whisper. “We have a lot to discuss tomorrow.”

Hiccup didn’t quite like the sound of that, but he was too comfortable to really care, too tired. He closed his eyes, hoping he, or Viggo, would not have any nightmares.


End file.
